Canadian Wildfires and Your Indoor Air Quality

We are here to help you stay safe & healthy from the Canadian Wildfires and Air Quality Alert!

As we’ve all seen, smoke from wildfires in Canada has been moving in, pushing air quality into the unhealthy or worse categories. Minnesota had the worst air quality in the country yesterday afternoon, it was the highest Air Quality Index since 1980 when the records began. The unhealthy air combined with warm temperatures and low winds produces an environment for Volatile Organic Compounds (VOC) and Oxides of Nitrogen (NOx) to react in the air to produce elevated levels of ozone.

We have been following along the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency closely. The good news is, it is getting better, yesterday we were in the red meaning it’s unhealthy for everyone, and today the majority of Minnesota in the orange, meaning it is unhealthy for sensitive groups.

Sensitive groups include:

People who have asthma or other breathing conditions like COPD
People who have heart disease, high blood pressure, or diabetes
Pregnant people
Children and older adults
People with increased exposure to the outside air (i.e., people who don’t have air conditioning and need to keep the windows open to stay cool, people who do heavy or vigorous physical activities outdoors etc.)

What should you do?

Choose less strenuous activities (like walking instead of running) so you don’t breathe as hard.
Shorten the amount of time you are active outdoors.
Check on family (especially those who fall into the sensitive groups category)

What can you do inside your home to improve your air quality?

Now is the perfect time to make the investment & upgrade. Here are the solutions we recommend! 🤧

Option 1: upgrade your 1-inch filter to a Polarized Media Air Cleaner

This is an electric air cleaner that polarizes the media filter which essentially turns the media into a magnet for dust and other contaminants to stick to. The contaminants from the smoke we're experiencing this week will be filtered out of the air you breathe in your home.

Option 2: If you have a 4-inch air cleaner, consider upgrading to a higher MERV rating that fits in your current filter rack and isn't restrictive. We recommend MERV 13.

Higher ratings ensure your air cleaner will catch the airborne particulate matter that is floating around, as small as 0.3 microns. We offer four versions of MERV 13's on our filters page, HERE. Or you can always head to your local hardware store and pick one up that has MERV 13 on the box!

If you have any concerns about your indoor air quality or any products we offer, please give us a call at 612-824-2656 📞